This patent application is related, in general, to information retrieval and in particular to a query and transformative engine applicable to eXtensible Markup Language (XML) documentation.
As society becomes increasingly more computerized and as greater access is allowed to information stored on computers, it has become increasingly more important to find such information in as efficient a manner as possible.
For example, the development of computerized information resources, such as the Internet, and various on-line services, such as Compuserve, America Online, Prodigy, and other services, has led to a proliferation of electronically available information. In fact, this electronic information is increasingly displacing more conventional means of information transmission, such as newspapers, magazines, and even, television. The World Wide Web consists of a number of Web sites located on numerous servers, most of which are accessible through global computer networks. The primary issue in all of these resources is filtering the vast amount of information available in order that a user obtain that information of interest to him and receiving such information in an acceptable format. To assist in searching information available on the Internet, a number of search techniques have been devised to find information requested by the user.
These search techniques are based upon a node by node search. When the node does not contain xe2x80x9cspeechxe2x80x9d (defined as viewable material for the reader), the search will navigate to the first child of the node and keep on navigating down each node string until speech is found. By being forced into examining each node separately, such searches are time and resource consuming.
In addition, none of these search techniques incorporate a transformative sequence for adjusting the information to the requirements of the user.
There is a need in the art to develop a query system that is easy to use and intuitive. There is an additional need to combine such a query engine with a transformative sequence to allow documents to be presented to users in the format they require.
A computer-implemented method of retrieving information in a first markup language through a query engine and presenting the information in any required markup language is shown. A user inputs a query to achieve one of two possible outputs: In the first usage, a query stands alone and the output of the engine is the information matching the query. In the second usage, transformative sequences are combined with queries. These sequences contain a markup language pattern and an action; the action may include transforming the tags in the first markup language to tags in a different markup language. The output of the engine in this second case is information matching the queries and transformed by the sequences specified. In either usage, the query is compiled from its source format into a sequence of instructions for the query engine. The compiled query is assigned tags and attributes. The database is then searched node by node for the corresponding tags and attributes. A predicate check using the binary coding of the node as well as ancestor and descendant information confirms the node. The leaf information associated with a confirmed node is then stored. If necessary, the action from the transformative sequence is applied to change the markup language of the leaf information to that of the user.
A primary object of the invention is to provide a query engine capable of making partial searches and conducting predicate checks on such searches.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide an abstract engine with both query and transformative capabilities to access a document and transform it to a requisite format.
It is still another object of the invention to provide a query engine that can produce more than one result on demand.
It is another object of the invention for the query engine to be state-preserving so that the engine can reactivate a prior search.
An object of the invention is to execute XML tag-level search and retrieval.
Furthermore, another object of the invention is to provide an engine that can both process a query and validate the results efficiently.
A further object of the invention is for the transformative engine to present the XML scripted document in HyperText Markup Language (HTML), Handheld Devices Markup Language (HDML), and other presentation formats.
Another object of the invention is to access XML tag-level scripting and perform eXtensible Style Language (XSL) ready transformation on such scripting.